hendrick 2019

[QUOTE="Team Penske, post: 1559594, member: 8665"89





I will always wonder what drove Ray Evernham away from HMS??????[/QUOTE]


Other than the fact that Chrysler GAVE him a two car team, sponsorship for the cars and made him the lead team for their brand? Ray's now multi-milionaire and never has to do a real day's work the rest of his life. Whatever Rick was going to pay him,it wasn't going to be THAT much.
 
Other than the fact that Chrysler GAVE him a two car team, sponsorship for the cars and made him the lead team for their brand? Ray's now multi-milionaire and never has to do a real day's work the rest of his life. Whatever Rick was going to pay him,it wasn't going to be THAT much.

Yeah, I'd say Ray made the smart choice starting that team.
 
[QUOTE="Team Penske, post: 1559594, member: 8665"89





I will always wonder what drove Ray Evernham away from HMS??????


Other than the fact that Chrysler GAVE him a two car team, sponsorship for the cars and made him the lead team for their brand? Ray's now multi-milionaire and never has to do a real day's work the rest of his life. Whatever Rick was going to pay him,it wasn't going to be THAT much.[/QUOTE]

I wasn't aware it happened at the same time. Of course I wasn't aware there was a company
Gordon/Evernham Motor Sports either.

1999

Car owner. Evernham left Hendrick Motorsports and Gordon/Evernham Motorsports in 1999 to form his own team, Evernham Motorsports. The team ran debuted in the Winston Cup Series in 2000 out of Bill Elliott's race shop in a limited schedule with Casey Atwood.
 
Long story short, by the end of the 1998 championship season, Ray was getting burnt out as a crew chief and was starting to think about his next mountain to climb. The Gordon Evernham Mororsports deal was an effort for him to do something where he was in control and call most of the shots, but at the same time. he was becoming more and more irritated at seeing Jeff make ten times (or more) the money he was making, he was tired of people asking whether it was Ray responsible for the team's success, or Jeff and or HMS as an organization. Top that off with Jeff's business manager really pissing Ray off, and the fact that despite the on-track success, Jeff and Ray were starting to snipe at each other quite a bit. Rick wanted Ray to move into a management role at HMS, but Ray wasn't sure that's what he really wanted to do. Meanwhile, Chrysler approached Rick about leaving Chevy and doing the Dodge program. When Rick said no, Dodge approached Ray and Jeff as a pair. This time, Jeff said no, but Ray saw an opportunity and began negotiating with Chrysler. By late summer, it was a done deal except for making the announcement and the parting of the ways. The whole thing kind of blew up into the public when rumors of HMS trying to hire Tommy Baldwin Jr to be Jeff's crew chief leaked out, which also reignited the old Jeff Gordon-Bill Davis hard feelings. By the end of September, it became obvious that Ray finishing out the year at HMS was not going to be possible, so he left, and Brian Whitesell was named the interim crew chief. The team proceeded to win the next two races with Whitesell on the pit box and then named Robbie Loomis the new crew chief over the winter and Whitesell became the team manager. Gordon Evernham Motorsports finished out the 1999 season in the Busch Series, by running Charlotte, where they finished second, and Phoenix, which they won. By that point Jeff made it clear to Ray that he could not be involved in the team with the manufacturer conflict coming up. Ray was NOT happy, especially since Jeff controlled the sponsor (Pepsi). Jeff brought that sponsorship deal back into HMS, and and they fielded a Busch car with Jeff and Ricky Hendrick sharing the seat on a part time schedule. This Busch team laid the groundwork that brought Ricky into team management, Brian Vickers into the organization, and also spawned the team that Gene Haas bought from Rick that turned into SHR.
 
Because of my schedule I don't get to watch near as many races as a lot of fans on here so I don't know what goes on at a lot of them but I noticed at the start of the season Bowman was the second best of the HMS cars in qualifying but he had a lot of things out of his control hurting him on race day. Then I noticed he tagged the wall in qualifying at 1 race and tagged the wall during a couple of races after that and has not been a contender like he was at the start of the season. I know its not like Alex to drive over his head and I'm pretty puzzled at the lack of performance all of a sudden. He has went from being one of the best HMS teams at the start of the season to being the worst in the past few races.:confused:
 
Because of my schedule I don't get to watch near as many races as a lot of fans on here so I don't know what goes on at a lot of them but I noticed at the start of the season Bowman was the second best of the HMS cars in qualifying but he had a lot of things out of his control hurting him on race day. Then I noticed he tagged the wall in qualifying at 1 race and tagged the wall during a couple of races after that and has not been a contender like he was at the start of the season. I know its not like Alex to drive over his head and I'm pretty puzzled at the lack of performance all of a sudden. He has went from being one of the best HMS teams at the start of the season to being the worst in the past few races.:confused:
It's been confusing to me also. It's like a switch was thrown.
 
Could be his Crew chief is not giving what he wants and trying to make him drive the car they give him.
 
HMS qualified 1 and 2 four times in the first eleven races. Dominating Dover on speed (currently in the middle of stage 2). I'd say it's time to retire the "Camaro problem" as an excuse. It's time for these four drivers to nail some skins up on the wall.
 
2nd, 3rd, 5th, 8th, and Jimmie Johnson running in 14th. Quite a few laps led by Chevrolets today. What Camaro problem? :p
 
2nd, 3rd, 5th, 8th, and Jimmie Johnson running in 14th. Quite a few laps led by Chevrolets today. What Camaro problem? :p
That it was still 3 tenths a lap slower than the 19. :owquitit: Chase's laps led were fool's gold because the 19 had to start in rear.
 
confidence is big for those young guys. Glad to see it going on with top 5's. I hope they bust off one at Kansas.
It definitely is for sure. Since I'm hanging out here at the track next to the Charlotte Motor Speedway for a week before I head to Richmond I decided to go over to the HMS Museum again today. I also saw Harvicks hauler heading to Kansas today. Some of the Arca teams were testing here yesterday and tonight the Late Models were testing on the dirt track.
 
I still refuse to believe they've ironed out all the kinks. I think they're close but I need to see sustained speed at the 1.5's. Kansas and the 600 will be huge for HMS.
 
I really hope they hit on something over the break before Dega and it wasn't just a one time wonder at Dover.

The field becomes much more interesting when they are in the mix on speed.
 
It is nice to see Chase move into 3rd in points and Alex to move into the top 10. Now that HMS has some competitive cars again it is getting interesting.:)
 
Lol yep I'm sold
Man, I’d love to say I am as well, but I need to see them improve the car to keep up with track and close one out at an intermediate. That said, the improvement this year has been much more rapid than last.
 
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